


a room in the dark

by contorno



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:34:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24239596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/contorno/pseuds/contorno
Summary: Bedelia has a nightmare. It isn't the first time.
Relationships: Chiyoh/Bedelia Du Maurier
Comments: 6
Kudos: 38





	a room in the dark

**Author's Note:**

> this is for the gays

The dinner table stretches endlessly before her. 

Bedelia raises her chin. When her bottom lip trembles, she gnaws at the inside of her mouth until her teeth pierce the smooth, pillowy flesh there. Her blood is warm and bitter. 

She can’t see the food – or she can, but it's all shapes and colors to her, which offers no clear picture of what she’s looking at. Her mouth waters at the different smells, sweet and savory mixing in the most delicate way. She knows she should not feel this way, however, and so nausea settles at the pit of her stomach. 

Then, footsteps echo through the hall, slow and dull, growing louder with every second. 

She doesn’t have to look to know who they belong to. 

* * * 

The darkness of the bedroom doesn’t suffocate her. Instead, she finds comfort in the nothingness, at least until her eyes get used to it. Bedelia breathes, loudly, through her nose, as if exhausted. Her nightgown sticks to her back, soaked in cold sweat. 

“Did you have the dream again?” 

As if the sound of Chiyoh’s voice triggers something inside of her, Bedelia begins to see clearly in the dark. Chiyoh’s smile is warm, but with an underlying sadness. Moonlight spills across her face like water. 

Bedelia swallows, suppresses a sigh. “Yes.” 

They have this conversation every other night. Perhaps that means she should have gotten used to the dream by now. But the image of a dinner table and then the sound of footsteps getting closer and closer and closer haunts her, and she’s lost count of how many times she’s woken up like this, fear and a sense of doom lingering below her skin even as she calms herself. 

Although, to be fair, she doesn’t truly have to calm herself anymore. 

Chiyoh slides further under the blanket, until her head is level with Bedelia's collarbone. 

“Let's see, then.” 

She doesn’t wait for Bedelia’s response, doesn’t have to. It has become something like a routine for them. 

Her touch is gentle but firm. She begins at Bedelia’s feet, patting down every inch of them before moving on to her calves and thighs, and doing the same there. Next are her arms. Chiyoh’s search starts at the top of them before, slowly, gliding down. It ends at Bedelia’s hands, each of her fingers caressed carefully, knuckle for knuckle. 

Some nights, when they’re less tired, she does all of this with her mouth. Of course, that journey wouldn’t end here. 

Chiyoh tilts her head up to look at her. “It’s all still there. Every part of you.” 

“Thank you,” Bedelia says, but the words don’t feel like enough. 

She places one of her hands on Chiyoh’s soft cheek and kisses the crown of her head. Her hair smells faintly of her lavender shampoo. Chiyoh takes her hand and laces their fingers together before she slides back up the bed to her pillow. 

“In your dream,” she begins, moving her thumb across the back of Bedelia’s hand, “was he alone?” 

They avoid using their names whenever it’s possible. Perhaps they hope, foolishly so, that someday they will have forgotten them altogether, which, in a way, would cause them to cease to exist. 

“I only heard one pair of footsteps. But, of course,” she takes a deep breath, “that doesn’t mean he was alone.” 

She can imagine them so clearly; their footsteps synchronized by now, their two bodies like one monstrous thing. Despite her best efforts, she thinks about them every day. She hopes they’re dead, and if they aren’t, she hopes they’re happy, deeply happy, so that they will never think of her again. 

But perhaps true happiness is impossible for them while she is still alive. 

“He’ll come to kill me, won’t he? With him?” 

“He will certainly try.” Chiyoh brings their hands to her mouth and presses her lips against Bedelia’s thumb. “But you have nothing to worry about.” 

A curious smile tugs at the corners of Bedelia’s mouth. “I don’t?” 

“Yes,” Chiyoh says. She lowers her voice, as though she’s going to tell her a secret. “Because I won’t let them hurt you.” 

Bedelia laughs quietly. Her hand slips out of its embrace to caress the other women’s cheek again. 

“My angel,” she sighs. “I know you’re naturally inclined to do so, but I don’t want you to think of me as someone you have to protect.” 

“What is it that bothers you about it? That it implies a kind of helplessness?” 

“No. I suppose I am helpless in that regard.” She smiles, although she isn’t sure if Chiyoh can see it. With the moon behind her, her face must be shrouded in darkness. “But I fear it makes me seem like I have nothing to offer, and I’d rather you don’t have to see me that way.” 

“I assume saying that I don’t see you that way won’t help?” 

Bedelia doesn’t reply, which is in itself an answer. 

“So promise you will protect me in return, then.” 

An amused smile stretches across Bedelia’s face. “I thought we had already agreed upon my helplessness.” 

“What is helplessness in the face of love?” 

A bittersweet ache spreads in Bedelia’s chest and so she surges forward, capturing Chiyoh’s lips with her own. 

“I promise I will try to protect you, in whatever way I can.” 

Chiyoh smiles. In all her years, Bedelia has never seen anything quite this breathtaking. 

“That’s more than enough,” Chiyoh says. 

Bedelia pulls her closer again. 


End file.
